The Caved Life (2020)

no talking heads, just people

Four documentaries which flow into each other look at rural life and social issues in the Nang Non river area of Chiang Rai. Each section focuses on the daily life and concerns of an individual. It's not about the 2018 cave rescue, although that is part of the background.

As such it's slice of life. There are no talking heads, just people. Some of the conversations between them are probably somewhat staged, others probably not.

I went in not knowing anything about it so it took a while to understand the format. I found it interesting and absorbing in its own quiet way. It's not the kind of documentary where you come away with a list of facts or details. It's more like I spent some time with people I would never meet otherwise and I'm glad I did.

The title is available to stream internationally on Thai PBS with English subtitles baked in. So no CC button like we're used to looking for. Fortunately I was looking for info to add it to the database so I hit play....

(That breakdown of ratings really doesn't work for this, so I just used my overall 7 for the parts as well.)

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